


What would she do?

by kenwaroo



Category: Sunless Sea
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Translation, still not a native speaker so yeah
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-25
Updated: 2019-04-25
Packaged: 2020-01-31 17:02:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18595612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kenwaroo/pseuds/kenwaroo





	What would she do?

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [What would she do?](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18595531) by [kenwaroo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kenwaroo/pseuds/kenwaroo). 



"What would I do without you?" asks Lady Black, stroking his cheek. Captain responds with a condescending smile, kissing her hand.

He doesn't know for how long he have been here since the silky fabric of her dress wrapped around him and dragged him here. To the world where everything belonged to them and them only. London, all of the far shores and even the roof of the Neath, where the Storm and Starved Men once resided. No one around them, no sight of the saving light. Captain gave up everything for the eternal calmness in the ill flames of thousands of candles and the lulling embrace of His Lady. Sometimes he feels like he spent an eternity with her. Sometimes he feels like he saw the beginning and the end of the world, creation, and destruction of the Great Chain of Being. The world around him is something else and he doesn't want to know why and how she created it. He kisses Lady Black instead through a black veil on her face.

He calls her Your Highness, bowing his head with unexpected grace and polite smile.

When he's alone in his dark, cold mansion, he's trying to remember. Wild flow of the waters takes away his memories, but every night familiar faces flash before his eyes one after the other. Captain can't remember their names, can't remember who they once were to him. He thinks that some of them he called his officers. He supposes that he condemned them to have disturbing dreams about a woman in black and a man with shining crystal skin every night of their lives. Captain forces a bitter smile, looking at his own hands at night. Hands, that are no longer human. His spleen and liver, his lungs and tongue, his bones and skin, even his groin!.. He can't remember when he turned himself into something else. But is this really important, when His Lady lets him bite her between her shoulder blades just to let him express his anger and grief in some way?

They are not human beings. Lady Black is someone, who doesn't really exist, and the only human part of him is his aching heart.

He often thinks what will happen when — not if that's for sure — Lady Black will get fed up with his attention and his silent company. Will she get rid of him just to replace him with someone else? Will she let him explore the eternal darkness of her lifeless version of the Neath instead of forcing him to spend his evenings with her? He grins, shaking his head, and the flow of the water gently leads him between the empty islands right into her arms so he can listen to another story about the Judgements and the Correspondence that drives the zee-sailors mad. Captain swallows up every word she breathes out, braiding dead flowers into her long, soft hair.

He can't call that thing between them "a relationship". Not anymore. Now he's declaring that they have an eternity between them.

By now he is used to the contemplative lifestyle. It was difficult considering his past life, filled with endless zee battles. Lady Black showed him the gift of thoughtful observation. Here, in the dark, insignificant details become bigger. Captain lost himself in the dangers of the Unterzee and quick affairs with his officers, not paying attention to the beauty of the smallest things. But now he sees. He sees them too well and they hurt him even more than Mt.Nomad wounds. His Lady leads him to God knows where like a patient teacher and, when they get there, she forces him to sit on the ground. He sees a little sprout in the dirt and looks at His Lady, trying to understand why he's here. She gracefully points to a small plant and leaves without a word. Captain watches as a beautiful rose blooms and silently dies, turning black. He plucks a fragile flower from the ground, carefully observing it and, after a few seconds, crushing it with his hand.  
In moments like this, he wants to escape this awful place or drown in the depth of the depths, leaving His Lady behind, but instead, he smiles bitterly and kisses her in the corner of her lips.  
He chose this path himself, didn't he?


End file.
